Probabilistic clearing of the reactive power market in the presence of solar power plants and considering the solar irradiance variations

Abstract

With the advent of renewable energy plants, new sources have been created to provide reactive power. This paper first explores the importance of renewable energy sources growth, especially solar power plants, then it examined the participation of solar power plants in the reactive power market. Various cost components of the solar power plant have been investigated and a general cost function model has been proposed for all reactive power suppliers that help the independent system operator (ISO) to better manage the system. Considering the probabilistic nature of energy generation from solar power plants, solar irradiance variations are considered in the reactive market and a probabilistic structure is proposed. To simulate and to consider the probabilistic nature of solar irradiance, the Monte Carlo method is used in simulations. The proposed method has been tested on the IEEE 24 buses system and two definitive and probabilistic markets are compared. As stated in the results, the proposed algorithm has satisfactory results.